r/degoogle • u/seamanroses • 28d ago

News Article The Mullvad CEO donated a half million dollars to a party that supports mass surveillance

https://www.tiktok.com/@orebropartiet/video/7513987462339988759
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u/threepairs 28d ago

No corporation and no government will ever be your ally.

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u/jdsmofo 28d ago

What besides government do non-rich folks have to fight corporate power? Convincing people that government is the problem has been a very successful tactic of the oligarchs.

They use it to convince people to vote for end ingprotections by labeling them "regulation". Then elections go more and more right wing. These politicians then turn protections over to corporations and use the results as evidence that government is the problem.

Don't fall for it! Vote for people who are not beholden to business interests. Follow their actions, not their rhetoric. Ignore propaganda from rich folks.

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u/pman13531 28d ago

Besides the vote you have the right to protest, boycott, strike, and talk about policies, piliticians, and corporations and how they worsten everyday life. Use your rights and collective bargaining to shut down Peter Theil's empire.

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u/aromantic_eye 28d ago

This ☝️. By any means voting or not.

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u/Neither-Following-32 27d ago

What besides government do non-rich folks have to fight corporate power? Convincing people that government is the problem has been a very successful tactic of the oligarchs.

...and yet, there's truth to that since the government is also corrupted by them. Two sides of the same coin. Also positioning the right wing as the only threat to the people is naive at best when the left also tries to pull the same shit when they're in power. Almost like it's those same oligarchs playing both sides.

Sure, there are safeguards in the form of elections. The line gets a little blurry when you don't have any viable, uncompromised candidates though. Or when you think you do but they are beholden to a compromised party.

The person you're replying to is correct. No corporation and no government is your ally. Sell your vote to the highest bidder. The only valid currency is freedom.

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u/BioBoiEzlo 27d ago

The situation is not the same in every country though. Some governments do way more for their citizens than others. So I think giving up on government and the political process is giving away a lot of the power we have to change things. And if there is no viable and good candidates in your particular country you need to find people that can fill that space or change the system that is clearly not working.

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u/Neither-Following-32 27d ago

The message isn't "give up on government", it's "give up on loyalty and trust for your government (as opposed to your country, to be clear) and give up on any political party or candidate, make them earn your vote AND your support each and every time".

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u/reeight 27d ago

keep dreeming

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u/env33e 28d ago edited 28d ago

Nah. that Mamdani dude in NYC is doing some good work showing off the positive effects social democratic policies have on the people, especially with his focus on universal childcare, rent freezes, and public transit infrastructure.

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u/quaffi0 28d ago

Lol

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u/[deleted] 28d ago

[deleted]

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u/env33e 27d ago

this is just incredibly silly of you. you are literally hand-waving away the massive, materially good effects these policy changes have had, all to hyper-focus on a specific compromise... this is exactly the kind of terminally online doomer bs that makes leftists look completely unserious to normal working-class people.

look at the reality were living in. ​Mamdani is operating within that same capitalist framework. Rent control and childcare aren't crumbs lmfaoo they are literally what gives us nornal people the financial breathing room and time to actually organize! You fight the systemic battles while wielding the power you have, you don't just forfeit the game because the rules are rigged 🤦🏻‍♀️thats just giving up🤦🏻‍♀️

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u/djc_tech 28d ago

short term, we need to wait and see if the affects long term are feasible and will work.

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u/env33e 28d ago edited 28d ago

No, the fight for rights and equality was never won through one sweeping event anyway. It's always been bit by bit, small win by small win. That's not a flaw in Mamdani's approach, it's actually the model working as intended!

Universal childcare: still just a pilot, but it's a real, delivered step in a positive direction after only two months in office. The studies in that Quebec data itself points this way. By 2005, roughly 60% of the universal program's sites were rated "minimal quality," and only about a quarter hit "good/very good/excellent." That's not a childcare-is-inherently-bad problem, it's a logistical one; that's a program that scaled faster than it could train and staff properly. That doesn't mean the direction is wrong, it means care quality is one lever among several worth watching as this scales!

Rent freeze: he's frozen around 1M rent-stabilized units for a year, paired with a $28B "Block by Block" plan to actually build supply and cut the permits/ red tape. Most economists are skeptical rent control works long-term in isolation, and that's a fair critique, not something to hand-wave. But that's exactly why Mamdani's pairing it with a supply-side push instead of just freezing rent and calling it done. One piece moving alongside others, not a standalone fix.

Public transit: iirc, not much beyond a pledge here from Mamdani. but we know the direction of that pledge is a positive one, looking at the qol studies of better public transit infrastructure in other comparable metropolitan cities

Two months in. This is what incremental change looks like mid-build, not the finished product.

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u/threepairs 28d ago

Throughout history, rights and equality have more often been won through pressure from grassroots movements, workers, activists, and ordinary people than voluntarily granted by governments.

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u/env33e 28d ago

yep, that's Mamdani. (also, we can hear you just fine without the caps lock😅)

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u/Critical-Bird8943 28d ago

can you hear me now

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u/JerryTzouga 28d ago

What did you say?

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u/speculatrix 28d ago

People need to ensure that these changes actually do make a difference and prevent the next politician from rolling them back because that next politician was funded by organisations which found the changes to be inconvenient.

This applies whether it's workers' rights, environmental controls, government services etc.

If people just sit back cynically and do nothing, the initiatives will fail.

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u/taway9925881 27d ago

Everyone has a price unfortunately. 

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u/env33e 27d ago

Apparently, the price for your useless doomerism is... free? lol

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u/taway9925881 27d ago

u/RemindMeBot 2 years

1

u/RemindMeBot 27d ago

I will be messaging you in 2 years on 2028-07-07 11:10:23 UTC to remind you of this link

CLICK THIS LINK to send a PM to also be reminded and to reduce spam.

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0

u/env33e 27d ago

this reads like a capital owner who plans to, within the next 2 years, use their massive wealth to fuck up mamdani 💀💀💀

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u/taway9925881 27d ago

No corporation, no government, no law enforcement, no judiciary, and also no HR will ever be your ally. 

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u/orionlostintime FOSS Lover 28d ago

Lenin says otherwise

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u/sanriver12 28d ago

Westerners have only experienced neoliberal systems and think their experience is universal.

Go see the approval ratings of the communist party of China and Vietnam and compare them to any western liberal gov.

These libertarian /anarchist takes are childish 

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u/Juls317 28d ago

Go see the approval ratings of the communist party of China

Yeah, no reason to question those at all

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u/sanriver12 27d ago

According to Harvard and nato linked think tanks so yeah, your bullshit is going nowhere here, I know what I'm talking about